FLAG OF OUR FATHERS ACTOR GEORGE GRIZZARD DIES

[mary mary]

George Grizzard has died at the aged of 79. His last screen appearance was in Clint Eastwood's 2006 film Flags of Our Fathers, he played the elder John Bradley.



Mary

[KC]

Thanks, Mary Mary. Here is a link to his obituary in the New York Times:

New York Times permalink

[Holden Pike]

Grizzard had been acting on the stage, TV and movies since the mid 1950s! To me he'll always be best remembered and beloved as the Father-In-Law to-be in Bachelor Party (1984), that crude little R-Rated comedy Tom Hanks made before Splash put him on the path to movie stardom. It's one of those movies that is so bad and so cheesy it's actually quite funny. Embarrassingly I have seen this film well over fifty times. Well over. A bunch of friends and I used to watch it together all the time, sort of a ritual at the end of our summer nights. But apart from Bachelor Party, some of my favorite roles of his were as the Governor in Neil Simon's Seems Like Old Times (1980), as author Richard Larson in the made-for-TV Ted Bundy piece "The Deliberate Stranger" (1986) starring Mark Harmon, and a recurring guest spot as clever and jovial defense attorney Arthur Gold on various seasons of the original "Law & Order".

In George's honor I must treat you to this scene from Bachelor Party...

MR. THOMPSON
(George Grizzard)
Rick, I want to cut through the B.S.

RICK GASSKO
(Tom Hanks)
I'd like that.

MR. THOMPSON
Good. I think you're an @sshole. No,
let me correct that: an immature
@sshole. Which is fine, except that
you're marrying my daughter and I'm
afraid that my grandchildren are
gonna be little @ssholes.

RICK GASSKO
Mr. Thompson, I...

MR. THOMPSON
No, let me finish. Debbie is an adult,
she can do what she wants, but if
you want your marriage to last you
have to change some things about
yourself. Now, if I may make some
suggestions?

RICK GASSKO
Oh, feel free.

MR. THOMPSON                 
Good. First, you're a slob. You dress
like a bum. Second, you're unmotivated.
You have no self-esteem, no thought
about the future. You're inconsiderate.
You're insensitive. You're insincere...

[SCENE CUTS AWAY AND RETURNS FIVE MINUTES LATER, THE LIST CONTINUING]

MR. THOMPSON
...and you're irresponsible. A show-off.
You're vulgar. You're inappropriate.
You're unrefined. You're obnoxious.

RICK GASSKO
Well, Mr. Thompson, that's really quite
a list. And you're right, you're absolutely
right. And I think, if I really apply myself,
I could be a totally changed person by
the time we finish lunch.

[Jed Cooper]

God bless Mr. Grizzard.  I remember him from a funny comedy with Chevy Chase & Goldie Hawn, Seems Like Old Times.  Charles Grodin was in that, too.  Mr. Grizzard played a political figure, a small part.  I recently saw him in an old Mark Harmon t.v. movie, too, where Harmon played a serial killer.